Installing n8n: Which Option to Choose

There are several installation routes and they are not equivalent: the choice determines what upgrading, migrating and recovering will look like.

Cloud versus self-hosted

Cloud. Nothing to stand up, upgrades are not your problem, access is immediate. You pay a plan, usually capped by operation count. Data passes through the service.

Self-hosted. Data stays with you, per-operation billing disappears and you pay for a VPS. In exchange you take on duties: upgrades, backups, availability, HTTPS.

How to choose, one question at a time:

Is the data sensitive? If yes, the question is settled: self-hosted.
What is the operation volume? At scale, self-hosted is cheaper by a multiple.
Is there anyone to maintain it? If not, cloud honestly solves the problem faster.
Do you need inbound webhooks? Both work, but self-hosted needs a public address and HTTPS - see triggers and webhooks.

For Russia specifically, paying for cloud is complicated, which is one reason self-hosting is more common there - details in n8n in Russia.

Docker

The default for ongoing use. What it gives you:

Reproducibility. The same environment on any machine.
Simple upgrades. Swap the image, restart.
Isolation. No dependencies pulled into the system.

What must be configured at launch, or it hurts later:

A data volume. Without one, everything vanishes when the container is recreated. Mistake number one.

The encryption key. Set it explicitly and store it. It encrypts credentials: lose it and you lose every credential even with an intact database.

The public address. Without it, n8n hands out localhost webhook URLs that no external service can reach.

The time zone. UTC by default, so “every day at 9:00” means nine in the morning UTC.

An external database instead of the file one for production. The file database suits a single user and small volumes and becomes a constraint beyond that.

The full version, including reverse proxy and upgrades, is in n8n in Docker.

npm and quick starts

Through npx. One command, no configuration. Ideal for looking at the interface and deciding whether the tool fits. Not for ongoing use.

A global npm install. Works, but survives Node upgrades badly and needs manual service setup. Fine for local experiments; Docker is easier on a server.

One requirement: a reasonably recent Node version. An old one produces obscure startup errors, and finding them takes longer than upgrading.

Choosing for your case

Situation	Route
See what it is	npx
Personal automations, low volume	Cloud or local Docker
Sensitive data	Docker on your own server
High operation volume	Docker on your own server
Nobody to maintain it	Cloud
A team and production	Docker plus an external database

First steps after installing

Set the encryption key and store it somewhere other than the server.
Check that webhooks return the right address, not localhost.
Set up database backups. Reconstructing workflows from memory is not possible.
Set the time zone.
Build a test workflow with both a schedule and a webhook to confirm both mechanisms work.

Next: triggers and webhooks and working with data. The overview is in the n8n guide.

FAQ

What is the simplest way to install n8n?

To try it, a single npx command with nothing to configure. For ongoing use, Docker: it gives a reproducible environment, simple upgrades and correct handling of the database and volumes. A global npm install works for local experiments but survives upgrades poorly.

Can n8n be used for free?

You can self-host it and pay nothing per operation - only for the server. It is fair-code rather than classic open source, and the restrictions concern reselling n8n as a service, not internal use.

What must be backed up after installing n8n?

The encryption key and the database. Losing the key means losing every stored credential even with an intact database. It is the first thing to set up after installing and the thing people remember too late.

Installing n8n: The Options and How to Choose